Tactful Words
by Flying Chariot
Summary: Their lives cross, as does fate. A collection of moments between the Shepherds' legendary tactician and Rosanne's wyvern rider.


**_Hi there!_**

 _ **Let me start by saying that has been lingering around my head for a while. After thinking about it, I have decided to attempt in writing Fire Emblem fanfiction, focusing on an underutilized pairing that I believe deserves more love – Robin/Cherche. Not a lot stories on the FE archive focus on this pairing, so why not? This will be a compilation of moments between our wyvern rider and tactician, expect each one shot to be of different scenarios, some could even correspond too. Also, I may add other pairings on the side for this collection.**_

 _ **The Fire Emblem series is owned by Intelligent Systems and Nintendo.**_

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When Virion commented that Minerva needed a mate, Cherche wanted to laugh. She viewed her wyvern as independent, strong, graceful, and the only companion Minerva needed was her. Knowing how the once duke from Rosanne had a passion for all things love and beauty, it was difficult to take his words sincerely.

However, she could not shake what Virion said from her conscious. She took a hard look at her wyvern after Virion made those frivolous remarks. Cherche noticed, for the first time, that Minerva appeared lonely. The wyvern was growing old, perhaps past her prime... Cherche realized that Minerva having no mate would deprive her of a wonderful experience. She too was living and sentient. The concept of romance and mating existed for an eternity's worth, especially for wyverns. Cherche decided that Minerva too, should indulge in such intimate practices among her own kind.

She set herself a goal – finding the perfect mate for Minerva. Of course, she consulted with her mount to see what expectations were placed. To blindly pair Minerva with a foreign wyvern would only lead to calamity. Cherche told herself to be attentive of Minerva's wishes and choose wisely for the perfect partner.

It was night at the camp, Cherche wandered into the stables to meet with her friend. There, she greeted Minerva and gave her positive news. "Hello Minerva, I have some great news to share. I have begun the search of finding your perfect mate."

The wyvern made a small cry and her owner chuckled. "You're going to love what I have found so far! Take a look." Cherche presented her a dossier filled with portraits of wyverns. Her mount looked down, inspecting each portrait she encountered flipping through them. Minerva released a snort and looked away apathetically, telling her owner she grew bored by looking at the portraits. "Oh my," Cherche said in response, pulling the dossier away from Minerva. The wyvern rider sensed her mount was not satisfied with the current findings, and thus sought to look harder. "Perhaps next time," she sighed.

Suddenly, Minerva dropped a book in front of her owner. Cherche rose an eyebrow quizzically as Minerva poked down at the book, signaling her to look inside. She picked it up, feeling its hard cover and wiping off the grime from it. The book's color was yellow with lightning engraved at the front and the spine. Suspecting what it was, Cherche flipped through the pages for assurance. "This is a tome, Minerva. Why do you have this?"

Her wyvern blankly stared her for a few seconds, lost. Cherche showed her the tome with the inscriptions, and the wyvern cried in shock, for she thought it was something completely different. Cherche gazed at the embarrassed mount with confusion, but then laughed when she realized the misunderstanding. "You thought this would have portraits of wyverns, didn't you?"

Minerva looked down in shame, feeling so foolish for thinking otherwise. Cherche reached out her gloved hands to cup her face, giving her a soft smile to soothe. "Oh it's all right, Minerva. We all make mistakes... and frankly, I found your gesture cute." Her mount released a puff of smoke as a response and Cherche laughed. "Don't worry, I'll make sure we find you the perfect mate. Just be patient, all right?"

When her companion nodded, Cherche looked back at the tome she held, curious of its origins. "Now then, this tome... where did you find it, Minerva?"

As Minerva was about to respond, a pegasus knight entered the stables and encountered the two. "Oh hello," Sumia greeted. "I didn't expect to see you here, Cherche. It's quite late."

"Greetings Sumia. What brings you here?"

"Oh, the reason for it is quite silly," Sumia explained, approaching her mount's box stall. "I'm going to take Belfire out in search for Robin's tome. It's missing, and he's been desperately trying to find it. We've been searching for it the past hour, but no such luck."

"Tome..." Cherche looked down at the book in her hand. She stopped Sumia from opening the box stall. "Wait, Sumia! I think I may have found it."

"Oh you did? That's wonderful! Now we can tell everyone the good news, where did you find it?"

"Well..." Cherche mumbled, as Minerva bashfully looked away. To save Minerva from further shame, Cherche simply chortled. "I found it near a tree not far from here, I have it in my arms."

"Oh, that's great! Do you want me to take it? I can deliver it to Robin."

"No, that won't be necessary. I'll do it, if you don't mind."

"All right, well I'll alert everyone else that it was found!" Sumia ran out of the stables, while Cherche sighed in relief that the pegasus knight did not suspect anything. "I suppose now I have to return this to its rightful owner," she said, and turned to her wyvern. "I'll be right back Minerva." Her mount released another snort in reply, and Cherche proceeded to walk off in search of Robin.

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Cherche wandered through camp once more, passing through a sea of tents to locate Robin's. As she searched she recalled what it looked like, and it was bound to be somewhere. When she arrived around the middle of camp, she noticed a large lit up tent upon her view. Through it the wyvern rider viewed a shadow sitting and shuffling through books. Cherche could trace the outlines of the figure and detected who it was, she pressed forward to the tent and opened the flap.

"Good Evening Robin," she said, meeting with the white-haired tactician who was organizing his work space.

Robin looked up, his eyes meeting up to her. When he saw her carrying his tome, he smiled warmly. "Hello Cherche, I see you have it."

"Ah, I assume Sumia must have informed you?" Cherche inquired.

"Quite so, I'm so glad you found it." He reached out his hand to receive his book. "I'll take it back now."

Cherche willingly surrendered the tome while Robin inspected it. He furrowed his eyebrows. "Hm, this looks a bit dirty. Where did you find it?"

"Did Sumia not tell you?"

"No, I just received the news."

Cherche suppressed a sigh, much to her own displeasure. Telling Robin the truth was now the correct option, especially if Minerva was not around. The wyvern would never be able to detect her telling Robin the true story anyway, so no true harm done. "Well, truth be told, Minerva had it. Initially, she thought it was something else but I had to prove to her otherwise."

"Minerva? Is that the name of your mount?" Robin asked, assuming it was whom Cherche was speaking about.

"Yes, that's my wyvern. I apologize for her taking your tome, she meant no harm. It was more of a misunderstanding on her part."

"I... I see, ah... haha..." Cherche blinked upon seeing Robin trying to suppress a laugh, only for it to backfire. "I wonder what she mistook it for," he added, wiping away his tears from the heartfelt laugh. He found the entire scenario amusing, and Cherche lightly frowned.

"Matters of the heart," she muttered, as she felt Robin was laughing at her companion for her error, rude.

Robin rose an eyebrow upon hearing that, his curiosity piqued tenfold. "Okay, now I'm curious."

Cherche huffed at the tactician, there was no leeway here. It was either tell or stay silent. "If you must know, Minerva is looking for a mate. She thought your tome had portraits of wyverns she could choose from."

"What? Minerva mistook my tome for that?"

"Yes, now is there a problem?"

"No, it's just – that's... er, interesting."

"It's part of an ongoing project I have with her," Cherche explained. "I have recently started compiling a file of wyverns for her to look at and see who suits her criteria."

"I see, I wish you luck on it."

"Yes, well..." The wyvern rider glanced upon the semi messy workspace Robin was fixing. The amount of time it would take to organize would take long. She asked, "Do you need help?"

Robin held down the stack of books he had on the side so they can firmly sit on place. "Oh, no it's all right. I can handle it."

"Perhaps you need some assistance, here let me help." Cherche knelt down next to the tactician and started to push around materials. She picked up another tome. "Where does this go?"

Robin blinked in surprise, the wyvern rider had completely ignored his wishes and was willing to aid him. He might as well take it. "Over there," he said, moving his head toward the left.

"All right, perhaps we should organize the tomes by rank? And maps and other notes can go on another pile..."

"That sounds doable."

As the two reordered the work space, Robin was impressed by Cherche's swift arrangement. Tomes on one side, maps on another, any extra books or scrolls on the other side. Meanwhile any writing utensils sat on another pile adjacent, while weaponry sat in the back. Within ten minutes, the rearrangement was complete, and the tactician was amazed. "Wow, everything is so in place... you're very good at this Cherche. Thank you."

"Oh, it all comes down to experience," Cherche replied with a smile. "I once did housework at Virion's estate after all."

"Housework? Oh, you served under Virion right?"

"Yes, I served as a knight... but I did mostly chores so I know the ins and outs of cleaning and organization. They were quite the workload, but they paid off."

"It most certainly did," Robin said with a smile of his own, more at so at his clean work space. "I really appreciate your help."

"Modest are we?" Cherche giggled. "It was a pleasure." She then stood up, preparing her farewell at the tactician. "Well, I must leave Robin. Minerva is waiting for me back at the stables, I don't want her to keep waiting for too long."

"Understood. Have a good night Cherche, and thank you."

"You're welcome, good night."

As Cherche walked out of the tent, she smiled... that ended quite pleasantly. Now she looked forward to meeting with Minerva again, and deemed the tactician as a kind person. Meanwhile, Robin sat down, statisifed. He could not help but smile at the organized work area Cherche had helped him with. Yet, he had other matters to attend to. He pulled out a map to formulate the next possible strategies the Shepherds could use.

And that was only the beginning.

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 ** _Well, that's all for now. What did you think? I will also note that this is going to start out steadily and slowly, which will gradually lead to Robin and Cherche's relationship in the future. Feedback is welcome, thanks for reading._**


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